


Waiting (for my real life to begin)

by VeriLee



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Merpeople, Bittersweet But Happy Ending Too, Canon-Typical Violence, Death from Old Age, F/M, Human!Ben Solo, Mer!Rey, MerMay, MerMay 2018
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-31
Updated: 2018-06-18
Packaged: 2019-05-16 10:04:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 11,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14809215
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VeriLee/pseuds/VeriLee
Summary: Rey could just sleep in the water; she should sleep in the water – she’s a River Dweller and will not drown, and it would hide her from the eyes of any land predators.However, she is fearful that, even if she winds herself into the pondweed and eelgrass as her kind usually do at night, the river’s current will tug her loose and pull her downstream during her slumber. She won’t risk being carried too far away, to a channel or branch she doesn’t know and won’t be able to find her way back from.After all, this bend is where her family said goodbye to her, and bid her to wait for their return. And Rey is very good at waiting.----Rey is a river mermaid, waiting oh so patiently for her family to return to her when an injured prince stumbles near her home. Perhaps the belonging she seeks lies ahead, and not in the past.A short mermaid AU, loosely inspired by a YA book called Sirena.





	1. One

_“Any minute now, my ship is coming in_

_I'll keep checking the horizon_

_I'll stand on the bow, feel the waves come crashing_

_Come crashing down down down, on me”_

_~*~*~_

 

_“Stay here. I’ll come back for you sweetheart, I promise.”_

Rey jolts awake, the last vestiges of her dream slipping away from her consciousness; the sleep-hazy image of her parents fading from her mind as her eyes opened to the bright morning light all around her. The memory of her father’s voice dissolves into the chirping the birds and the rustling of the trees.

She rises from where she slept – her upper body lying on a soft, algae-covered stone, her silvery tail trailing into the cool river water. In truth, she could sleep all the way on top of the rock – she loves the caress of the cool night breeze and the warmth of the morning sun, and she won’t dehydrate in the course of one night. But she likes the rush of the river tickling her tail.

She could just sleep in the water; she _should_ sleep in the water – she’s a River Dweller and will not drown, and it would hide her from the eyes of any land predators.

However, she is fearful that, even if she winds herself into the pondweed and eelgrass as her kind usually do at night, the river’s current will tug her loose and pull her downstream during her slumber. She won’t risk being carried too far away, to a channel or branch she doesn’t know and won’t be able to find her way back from. Her kind are meant to have a strong sense of direction, but Rey will not test it.

After all, this bend is where her family said goodbye to her, and bid her to wait for their return. And Rey is very good at waiting.

She slides off the rock and into the water. She submerges herself fully and inhales deeply. Her body sings with the sensation. She can breathe air perfectly well, but this is what her body truly delights in. She breaks the surface again, quenched, and uses her strong tail to push against the current and towards the bank of the river, as she does every morning.

A large, flat rock lies nestled among the cattails where the river grows shallow and blends into the solid earth. Rey pries up the rock – there are no spider webs or bug nests along its edges, for this rock is lifted every day and so the small dirt dwelling creatures know that it will not be a suitable home.

Underneath, a mussel shell, split in two, is nestled in the ground. Each half of the shell contains a handful of freshwater pearls; the final gift her parents had given to her. Rey’s mother had placed the shell into her daughter’s outstretched hands – one half was empty, and the other held the pearls.

“Keep these, and count the days, child,” Mother had said. “Take one pearl and put it into the other shell every morning when you wake. By the day you move the last pearl, we will return.”

On the morning that Rey had moved the last pearl, she could hardly stay still; hope and excitement coursing through her. She had swum in circles, fought the current to go upstream (and then let it carry her back), and pulled herself onto rocks just to dive back in, she had so much pent-up energy.

But the morning sun climbed high above, and then sank low again, chased out of the sky by the moon. Darkness had fallen and her family had not returned.

The next morning, Rey had pulled back her rock and moved one pearl from the full shell back into the emptied half. And she continued to do so every morning, though the fire of hope grew dimmer each time one of the shells was emptied again.

Rey had been such a young child then, only six or seven Arietids old. Her tail had been pure silver then, the tail of a young river dweller. She lost track of how many times she had restarted the counting game long ago, but she knows that the Arietids have streaked across the sky at least a dozen times.

Her tail is proof that she is no longer a youngling. What was once a simple, steely silver has developed undertones of shimmery blue and green and pink, and is speckled with dark spots. The subtle colors glitter and glisten when she skims the surface and they catch in the sun’s rays. These scales do not grow in until a river dweller has reached nineteen Arietids.

After her morning ritual is complete, Rey passes the time as she does any other day. She catches fish to eat and basks on her rock; warming her skin, golden and kissed by the sun. She swims a little downriver, then up – never too far.

She dives down to the riverbed, scavenging for little bits of treasure – pretty stones, fish bones, empty mollusk shells, broken bits of string and glass. These she likes to weave into her hair. She keeps her rich, brown hair tied into three knots, just like when she was a youngling, and Mother had helped her style it. The knots are fuller now; the hair they are made up of is much longer.

Today, when she re-ties her hair, Rey adds to her existing decorations a perch bone, strands of Water Stargrass, and a crawdad claw. She also finds flakes of gold that shimmer, so much like her own scales, but in a different hue, and presses those against her hair and skin, though she knows they’ll fall off after a bit of swimming.

Some of her favorite treasures are the things left behind by land dwellers – she is so very intrigued by their creations, and their strings and cords are so handy for tying things into her hair. She doesn’t find many near this bend in the river.

Before, when she swam from river to river with her family or visited their sea dweller kin, they would come closer to the vessels that land dwellers rode in, and some of the rivers wound along next to the dirt paths that they walked on. There were more trinkets to be found in those places.

But not many land dwellers travel on or near this river. Of course, that’s why Rey’s parents hid her here. Land dwellers had been hunting water dwellers – both in the sea and in the rivers – before her family hid her away.

Not many things can kill a river dweller, but some of the land walkers had learned the secret. Rey could be scratched or bitten or cut or even have a few scales ripped off in a tussle, but all these will heal in time. A dagger carved from the rarest of gemstones – a kyber crystal – can penetrate the heart of a river dweller, and carve wounds into their skin that will never heal.

Here, nestled in the safe, hidden curve of her river, Rey doesn’t need to fear the creatures that killed her kin – they so rarely pass by. However, she is doomed to another death, if twenty-three Arietids pass before…

 _No._ She won’t think of that now.

Mother and Father just wanted to protect her, Rey knows. They’ll come back for her before the end her twenty-third Arietid-fall.

_They will._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story will be short, and probably could have been posted as a one-shot. But I want to split the chapters for POV. Also, I'm not done yet, and I wanted to at least get the beginning posted while we're still technically in MerMay. :)
> 
> River Dweller tails are based on rainbow trout. Since trout usually spawn in late spring and early summer, so I decided that Rey's kind tracks their years by the the annual Arietids meteor shower, which lasts from late May to July 2nd, peaking around June 7th. 
> 
> Let me know what you think :) I treasure comments like Rey treasures her trinkets :)


	2. Two

~*~*~

 

Ben Solo staggers along a path that clearly hadn’t seen human traffic in years. He can see that at one point, the earth had been trampled down and packed tightly from regular use. Now, the forest has seized the land back. Only the faintest signs of the old road exist – the fact that it’s been worn a little lower than the land to either side, smooth stumps of trees that had been cut as close to the ground as possible, that the moss on rocks and felled logs isn’t as heavy.

The road would be hard enough to traverse even if Ben weren’t injured. But he is injured, and every time he stumbles on an upturned rock or a branch hidden in the tall grass, pain shoots through him, radiating out from his wounded leg.

Ben had bound it as best he was able,  using a broken branch as a splint, but the injury his ankle had sustained when his horse threw him - whether a sprain or a break - throbs with the slightest bump or bit of pressure.

His side is also in pain - when he landed, a jagged broken tree root had pierced his flesh. This wound doesn't hurt _quite_ as much but he knows it's more dangerous. The dull ache is bearable but if infection spreads, it may be deadly.

This is why he cannot rest. If he stops moving, his leg may heal but that will be of little importance if infection kills him.

He can hear the rush of a river; the sound has grown louder as he traveled the last two days. He's hopeful that following this path will lead him to it.  Perhaps the clan that once forged this road used it to fetch water for their camp. He doesn't have any medicine – doesn’t have anything except the knives he had strapped to his person and the now empty waterskin that he’d worn over his shoulder – his pack was cinched tight to the mount that threw him. Where the horse is now is anyone's guess. But if he can wash it clean with water at least, it will help.

He is out here, without a steed, without provisions, without anything worth trading…not that he’s encountered any people in several days. He seems truly alone in this desolate forest.

No. That’s not quite it. He hasn’t met with any _humans_ here. But there is a presence, something heavy and oppressing in these woods.

Before Ben rode into the depths – on a fool’s errand for his master, Sir Snoke – he paid no mind to rumors and tales that spoke of a haunted wood, of people becoming lost and going mad if they dared to enter, emerging with welts and mysterious bruises – _if_ they managed to emerge. It was nothing but poppycock and superstition, and Ben scoffed at the idea.

But now that he is here, he knows the rumors, exaggerated though they may be, are rooted in truth. He hears voices in the wind and swears that the trees sometimes twist or shift of their own accord. The animals of this forest are more skittish than other beasts he’s encountered before, and there are fewer of them. His own horse, Kylo, had been tense and on edge for days before something finally spooked him so deeply that he tossed Ben from his back and thundered away into the darkness. Ben is now certain that Snoke knew the true nature of these woods when he sent him here.

He knows that Snoke sent him on this task as punishment for his failure, Ben’s inability to convince his mother to grant Snoke a position on the Curia Regis. He had tried to argue that once he took the throne, he could easily appoint Snoke to any position, grant him any title.

But Snoke was displeased and to demonstrate his power over Ben, had ordered him to these woods to search for a Myrmecoleon – a live one – claiming he needed the fresh blood for a spell. It’s a taunt, Ben knows. Even children know that Myrmecoleons – the offspring of a lion and an ant – die within days of birth, as they can eat only meat but digest only grain. There is no way that Snoke is ignorant of this fact; he set Ben another task he was destined to fail.

As Prince of Alderaan, Ben is not bound to take orders from a knight – even a senior knight of Alderaan’s army cannot claim such authority over him, officially. However, Snoke teaches him methods of the magical arts that his parents try to hide from him. And so he must obey if he wants Snoke’s continued guidance.

Even if it means chasing down a creature he will never find, returning empty-handed, and accepting whatever new punishment comes next.

That’s if he manages to make his way back, anyway. Ben winces as his boot catches against a root hidden among the grass. A fresh wave of pain rolls through him, and flashes of white obscure his vision. He stops for a moment, leaning against a tree for support and breathing through the agony. Finally, he grits his teeth and limps along the faded path once again.

Of course, Snoke hasn’t taught him any healing spells. There may be plants in this forest, maybe even within arm’s reach, that could soothe his ache, tame his infection. But Snoke parcels out only small secrets of magic to Ben, and nothing terribly useful, always promising that he’ll teach him more, once he proves himself worthy.

Ben presses onward, though his progress is slow. His mouth is dry, yet his body is damp, his clothing heavy with sweat. Eventually, the forest begins to grow brighter; the trees are sparser here and he knows the edge of the woods must be near. Better yet, the burble of water grows ever louder with each excruciating step.

Eagerness, desperation, give Ben a renewed burst of adrenaline. He quickens his pace despite the stinging pain that courses through him, chasing the sun. Finally, _finally,_ he emerges from the forest’s reach and into open space. The river that had been calling him lies just ahead.

Ben rushes forward, recklessly, and his weak ankle gives way as the ground grows softer and marshier near the water’s edge. He falls to the ground but continues to drag himself closer to that lifesaving water. He detects a flash of movement from the corner of his eye, but his focus isn’t swayed. Relief floods his body as he leans over the bank and ducks his head to the water, drinking like an animal. The men and women of the court would be scandalized, to see the prince and heir to the throne behaving – and probably looking and smelling, by this point – like a stray dog.

He sits up, his thirst quenched. That’s one problem solved. The others…won’t be so simple. As the rush of adrenaline fades and Ben’s heart rate slows, he’s left with the very real fear that infection could still take him before he can find his way back to civilization. He now has the ability to wash his wounds, so he’s better off than he was a few days ago, but infection may have already set in.

He tugs off his dirt and thorn and leaf covered cloak and then unstraps his sword belt as well. He unbuttons and removes his shirt next; it is crusted to his skin with blood and he winces at the sharp sting when he rips it from his wound. He looks down, studying the gash. It is red and angry looking and hot to the touch. Not a good sign.

But there isn’t much to do at this point other than rinse it well and hope for the best. If luck is on his side, he may find some leeches and be able to bleed it. He watches the river a moment. The spot where he emerged from the forest is at a wind bend in the river. It’s flowing at a decent pace but isn’t too intense. He should be able to keep himself steady and not lose himself to the current, even with his bad leg.

Something rustles in the reeds just a bit downriver and this time Ben does turn towards the movement in time to see the late afternoon sun reflect brilliantly off of the tail of a particularly large fish. The flash of light is almost blinding and the fish seems almost _too_ large, even for a river as wide as this. But then the silvery glint is gone in an instant and Ben wonders if the pain of his injury or the presence he’d felt in the forest – or some combination of the two have caused some sort of delirium.

Ben draws himself back to the task at hand and makes quick work of the rest of his clothing. He sets his dagger down as well, with some trepidation. He’s reluctant to be without _any_ sort of weapon with which to defend himself.

He eases himself into the water slowly; the water is biting cold but it feels incredibly soothing against the gash on his side. He sighs and moves away from the bank, where the riverbed suddenly drops off sharply and he can easily submerge himself in the cleansing water. He lets the river dance around him until he needs air, his lungs stinging, and he pushes himself upward to the surface.

Ben emerges, gulps in the fresh air and suddenly, finds himself staring right into the vibrant eyes of a woman. He freezes in shock – he hasn’t seen another person in a fortnight and he’s sure he is far from any village or settlement. He can’t turn away.

Her face, though it looks as startled as he feels, is beautiful – golden skin kissed with freckles, a pink rosebud mouth, and those eyes…not quite brown and not quite green but somewhere in between. Her chestnut hair is tied into three knots and an array of glass and beads and shell and bone are twisted into them. But it’s her eyes that Ben cannot tear himself away from. He could drown in those eyes.

Time seems to stand still and yet it’s all over in a moment. The spell is broken as the young woman turns and dives under the water, a silvery tail, imbued with flashes of color, flipping out of the water behind her. She vanishes into the river and understanding suddenly washes over Ben.

 _Mermaid,_ he thinks.

But also: _Siren, Temptress, Sea Witch_.

Ben knows the stories, of the half-fish, half-human creatures that entrance unsuspecting humans and lead them to their deaths. However, he’s never encountered one himself. He’s only been on a handful of ocean voyages, where mermaids are more common but still tend to keep themselves well-hidden, and he was under the impression that freshwater mermaids were extinct, or very near so. Sir Snoke himself was always lamenting the lack of mermaid scales for his spells.

Ben is suddenly very aware of his vulnerability – not only is he in her territory, but he’s injured as well. He won’t stand a chance if she tries to attack him now. Ben frantically propels himself back to shore and closer to his weapons, particularly the Kyber bladed dagger that can defend against all manner of magical creatures.

But as he redresses, his initial panic subsides. He recalls the look on the mermaid’s face – it held no malice, only surprise and a hint of curiosity. He supposes it probably mirrored his own expression. Her position was not aggressive and _she_ fled from _him._

Ben reties his makeshift splint, using his tightly laced boots to hold it in place. He forgoes putting his shirt back on and instead washes it in the edge of the river, tearing it into strips to use as bandages on his side. The water did flush puss and dirt from the gash, but it is still red and painful.

He shuffles back from the bank of the river, his eyes darting along the surface all the while but the mermaid doesn’t show herself again. As the sun begins to set, Ben overturns some rocks and cobbles together a dinner of bugs. Not the most appetizing meal, but it’s been keeping him alive these past days, since hunting on a bad leg is difficult.

Ben keeps watching the river until it’s too dark to see. He keeps his Kyber dagger close just in case, though his gut tells him it’s an unnecessary precaution. Eventually, he lies down on his outstretched cloak, his worn body eager for rest. His thoughts linger on the mermaid as sleep overtakes him, and he hopes he sees her again.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know Ben's reaction may not have been exactly what was expected, but since he lives in a world that knows of mermaids, however rare they are, he's heard some stories, so there is some fear mixed in with the awe.
> 
> I know there's been a good deal of exposition so far, but now that Ben and Rey are in the same place, we can get to some dialogue/interactions! Hope to have Chapter 3 up by Saturday, but no promises. I'm also working on my other fic so that's taking up my time too. 
> 
> Thanks so much for reading! Hope you enjoy :)


	3. Three

_~*~*~_

 

It’s a day like any other.

Until it’s not.

Rey is laying on a smooth-topped boulder that doesn’t _quite_ fully protrude from the water. The cool caress of the river tickles her back as it skims over the rock, while her front soaks in the warmth of the late afternoon sunlight. It’s her favorite part of the day – the sun has covered the land, letting its warmth linger on everything it has touched, but the intensity of the midday glare is gone, replaced by something softer, gentler.

This is when she whispers to the Sky, choosing a cloud that maybe looks like a tail or her mother’s hands or her father’s face. She speaks to the illusion of her family, telling them of her day, of what new treasure she found today, of her hopes – and of her fears – and she sends them her love, hoping the cloud will carry her message to them. Clouds, though they travel by air, carry water, a little essence of her kind. And maybe it’s foolish, but Rey likes to think that maybe if that rain falls wherever her family is now, they’ll feel just a little bit of her love and her longing.

The sound of Rey’s voice is soft and blends in with the songs of nature around her – the gurgle of the river, the chatter of katydids, the rustling of wind in the trees. She hears the sharp crack of a twig or branch snapping from being stepped on but doesn’t pause. It’s likely just a deer, feeding near the forest’s edge; it isn’t dusk yet, but it’s not _terribly_ uncommon for deer to be active this early either.

But the ruckus from the bank near the forest’s edge grows louder, followed by a soft thud and something that sounds, inexplicably, like a desperate bark of laughter? The noise is loud and unusual enough that Rey grows quiet and still. Logically she is sure it must be some simple forest animal; she has rarely seen anything else in the decade she’s been here. But her instincts have her on edge, internally screaming, _new, strange, different!”_

Rey turns just her head, keeping the rest of her body as still as possible, so as to avoid drawing attention to herself. It takes a moment for her to process what she sees. The dark, bulky figure seems to move on four limbs like so many beasts of the land, but it is awkward. Its movement is slightly reminiscent of a lumbering bear, but something about the gait isn’t quite right, nor is the shape.

 _New, strange, different_ , that voice inside repeats, as her heart races in fear and confusion.

Then sunlight catches on the creature’s head and she sees its face. No, not _its_ face. _His_ face – a person’s face. Pale against the black hair framing it, with full lips and a strong jaw, and brown eyes, deep and dark and weary.

A person’s face, like hers …and yet not like hers at all. Because it is a man’s face, and more than that it is the face of a land dweller.

As that fact sinks in, as Rey recognizes that the unfamiliar figure is really the body of a land walker, crawling on the ground for some reason, and obscured by the layers of clothing their people wear, self-preservation kicks in and she hastens to hide. She twists and slips off her rock as swiftly as she is able and darts into a nearby cluster of reeds and watergrass. Part of Rey doesn’t like remaining in the shallows, but it allows her to peek out from the water concealed by the surrounding foliage, and she is far enough from the land dweller that if he were to move towards her, she could swim away before he even got close.

From her hidden spot, Rey watches the land dweller curiously. She has only seen a handful of these men and women in all her time here, and in those few instances, it was pairs or packs of land dwellers traveling alongside the river, using it as a compass for wherever they were headed. This man is alone and he wasn’t following the river – she’d have seen him much sooner if that were the case – he had emerged from the woods. She watches as he dips his face to the flowing water to drink, as a deer or wildcat might.

After drinking his fill, the land dweller begins to disrobe and Rey winces along with him as he pulls fabric from a wound, tearing at the skin and drawing fresh blood. His chest and arms are not so different from the men of people. Curious, Rey pushes herself forward. She miscalculates the depth of the water though, and her tail breaks the surface for just a moment. As the man turns in her direction, Rey ducks her entire body under the water and out of sight, scolding herself for nearly showing herself. She keeps her eyes open and trained in his direction, though her view is slightly distorted by the waves.

When the man resumes his task and then submerges himself into the water, however, Rey’s inquisitiveness gets the better of her again. She has never been so close to a land walker. Slowly, careful not to splash or make too grand of movement, she swims closer to the man, curious to see how different he is from her own kind, now that his body is not masked by cloth. She studies him, fascinated by both the similarities and differences between her people and him. She should fear him, but she does not.

Her eyes trail back to his face and linger there. His eyes are closed and Rey finds herself wishing he would open them again. When he begins to rise to the surface again, Rey, foolishly, follows. Her wish is granted and his sad, brown eyes open and stare into her own for one long moment. But she has exposed herself and instinct reigns once again as she twists and dives under the water, propelling herself a good distance away. When she stops and looks back, the man is no bigger than a jackrabbit.

Rey watches the bank where the man now sits – _her_ bank – but keeps her distance. Her heart races with fear, but also exhilaration and intrigue. She wants to know more about this creature, in parts so very different, and yet the same, as her.

She also wonders if he could be her key to more time. Perhaps the Guardian of the Skies heard the secret fear inside her heart, the fear that she might die and dissolve into the river waters before her parents return. It is the curse of the water dwellers that they must mate with a land dweller before their twenty-third Arietid-Fall; if they do so, they will earn a life that witnesses three-hundred Arietids before they travel to the Asphodel Meadows, but if they fail, their twenty-third will be their last.

Rey could not go seeking for a land dweller to mate with – she needed to stay close to her bend in the river so her parents could easily return to her – and no land dwellers had passed by since she came of age. Until now. Perhaps the Skies knew that Rey must wait _a little longer_ for her family to return, and sent her this man so she would not perish before they did so!

He hasn’t left yet; she’s watches but the man makes no move to depart back into the woods, nor to travel alongside the river. Instead, he redresses, eats, and makes himself a spot to rest as the sun sinks low into the sky and dusk crawls across the land and water alike.

Giddiness surges through her. She does not know how long this man will stay by her river, but it matters not. Rey was very young when she was last among her kind, but she still recalls her older cousins and kin, who had been successful in obtaining their gift. They didn’t keep the land-dwelling mates, returning, of course, to their homes in the depths of the waters when it was over.

Rey could go to him now, stir him with her song alone, and he would awaken, entranced by her. After, he would travel again, as no land dwellers make their homes in this area, and time would no longer be an enemy to Rey as she waited for her parents. It’s only a little dangerous – he _does_ have that dreaded kyber dagger. But as long as Rey begins singing before he can reach for it, he will be too mesmerized to attack.

With renewed purpose, Rey swims back upstream towards the man. He’s sleeping now, so she doesn’t even bother hiding in the water, just propels herself there as quickly as possible. In case he leaves in the morning, she will act tonight.

As she grows closer, she slows down. She doesn’t want to startle him before she can begin to sing. With a bit of effort, Rey pulls herself from the water and up the bank. The man is sleeping further from the water than she usually ventures. Nervousness returns to her now that she is so close.

Rey looks down at the man; he’s a large man, larger up close than she had realized, and strong and muscular. But for all that, he looks harmless as he sleeps. Except for that dagger, loosely gripped in one hand. Rey gingerly reaches for the hilt, heart racing, and she carefully but firmly stabs it into the ground, away from his reach.

She should start singing now, and wake him.

She doesn’t.

Rey is meant to enchant the land dweller but finds herself captivated instead. With him still and slumbering, she can study his face better than in their quick encounter in the river. He is pale, but now she can also see a smattering of moles and freckles; they are different from her own freckles, darker and she finds herself wanting to discover a constellation in them. There are dark circles under his eyes as well, as if he hasn’t slept soundly for some time now, and Rey feels a twinge of guilt over the thought of waking him up.

Another thing she hadn’t noticed before is the smell. It is a putrid stink, not unlike the carcass of a dead animal left behind after a predator has had its fill. It was masked by the natural aroma of the river before, and it is faint, but unmistakable to Rey’s sharp nose. She can pinpoint it easily – it is coming from the bloody wound on his side. The man’s chest is bare, but he’s bandaged the wound with scraps of fabric.

It isn’t enough. Blood is soaking through the fabric, and the skin surrounding it is an angry, garish red. Rey reaches out and places a cool hand against the spot; the entire area is hot to the touch. He twitches ever so slightly at the contact but doesn’t wake.

Rey will not wake the man to sing to him now. She could, and she knows that her song would be enough to distract him from even this pain. But she feels a swell of compassion for this land walker, wounded, and alone, without his own clan or people by his side. She thinks of his eyes and the sadness they held. Maybe he is lonely too. Rey heals from physical ailments easily, as water dwellers do, but she knows loneliness is its own source of pain.

She will sing to this man, convince him to give her the gift of three hundred Arietids, another day. First, she will help him. She cannot solve the melancholy she saw in his gaze, but she can help to heal his flesh wound.

Holding her breath and hoping the man doesn’t stir, Rey pulls back the bloodied bandage. It hasn’t had time to dry too much, and so doesn’t tear at his skin as she witnessed earlier. Then Rey bites her lip to keep quiet and tugs a handful of scales from her tail. It burns, but they will grow back. She can lose a few scales here and there without consequence. She presses them firmly to the man’s wound and he sighs almost immediately. She knows her scales have healing properties – they are unlike the scales of other fish. It is one reason the land dwellers hunted her kind, her mother had said, when she warned Rey to be cautious of land walkers.

Rey wants to wait and keep watch over the land dweller; watch to see if her scales are enough to counter whatever is festering in that gash. But she’s tempted fate long enough. Until she is ready to sing, Rey needs to keep her distance. Rey rolls herself back across the dirt and grass and sighs in relief as she slips back into the water. She will find a safe place to sleep tonight and hope the land dweller is still here when she wakes.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok so, I thought they would talk this chapter but I really wanted these two scenes. I had to change the chapter count a bit. Looking at 7 chapters instead of 5.
> 
> Just a note: I borrowed the timespan of 300 years to fit with a concept I already had in mind, and the part about the chance of becoming water/foam from Hans Christian Anderson, but that’s it. You don’t need to worry about Ben going off and finding a random princess to marry while Rey contemplates stabbing him or anything. That’s not happening here.
> 
> Thanks for reading :) I hope you enjoy :)


	4. Four

 ~*~*~

 

Ben startles awake, disoriented.

_Too much sun, it's too warm._

Then his senses grow stronger, as he emerges from his muddied, sleepy state. The loud rush of the river, the softness of the marshy soil under him - the lack of the oppression and foreboding of the dark woods.

_He's not in the forest anymore._

Ben's eyes open as his hand clenches around nothing. He looks down to find his dagger buried in the dirt a couple feet away. Had he thrown it in the night?

He crawls over to retrieve it and the next startling thing he notices is the pain in his side. Rather, he notices that it _doesn't_ ache nearly as it did last night. He'd cleaned it and had a good night's rest after the days of pushing his body to its limits, but this is unfathomable.

Ben leans back to gaze down at his stomach. The bandage is gone and he might have thought it had fallen off during the night, if not for the skin-like sheen coating it. Perplexed, he gently prods at the wound.

It isn't _gone_. He can see the blood through the shimmery substance; it's only partially opaque. And when presses down, a bit of pus oozes out.  But it's white pus, not green, and the surrounding skin is not so inflamed as it was before.

If he hadn't witnessed what he did yesterday, Ben would have been very confused. Actually, he is still confused, but only about the _why_ and not the _what_.

 _Mermaid scales_. He hasn't seen fresh ones before, nor even used the powder made from dried scales; they're too rare. But he’s seen illustrations, in the texts that describe magical objects and their properties. There is no other explanation.

Ben stares out at the surface of the river, incredulous.

_Is she out there? Even now?_

The river is flowing and waterbugs skip and dance along the surface; an occasional fish leaps out of the water and a bird swoops down to catch a meal.

But Ben sees nothing of the woman. He might have thought himself delirious with pain and fatigue yesterday if the proof of her existence weren't currently fixed against his flesh.

"Thank you," he calls out to the river, feeling a bit silly. _Is she still near? Does she even speak his tongue?_

Ben leaves the scales in place but pushes against the wound once again. More pus seeps out, and he pours some water from his waterskin over to rinse it.  It doesn't seem to need any bandage on top - the scales cling to his skin of their own accord.

After tending to his wound, Ben takes stock of his meager inventory. All he has is what was on his person or in his pockets when he lost his horse.

His kyber dagger, his long sword, and his boot knife. The waterskin, thankfully. A piece of flint and a few gold coins he kept in his pocket, and a seal ring that had once been his grandfather’s.

It isn't much, but he'll be able to gather water, hunt, and make fire at least. If the mermaid scales succeed at purging his infection, he'll get by until his leg is strong enough to walk on safely.

Ben sets to work making camp since he'll be here awhile. It isn't easy, crawling on all fours like a child, but he manages. But now that he is free from the forest – and free from the panicked rush to stave off infection – he knows it is wiser to put as little weight on his leg as possible, even if simple tasks take longer to complete.

By midday, he's fashioned together a small lean-to - just some sticks, roped with vines and seaweed to form a large, flat square, but propped against a boulder, it will make for a bit of cover if it rains. By midafternoon, he's washed his clothing in the river and let them dry in the sun.

But by nightfall, his attempts at creating snares to trap game, as have his pitiful attempts to merely lunge and attack any squirrels or rabbits he's spied.

Ben, like any young man of his station, is well trained in jousting and fencing, and more lethal forms of combat as well. However, facing off with another knight is a far cry from taking up a blade against these quick, skittish creatures. And he _has_ hunted before, but on horseback and with a bow; it doesn't translate well.

So dinner, again, is some berries and nuts he gathers from bushes near the forest’s edge, and some fat beetles dug out from under a log. He makes a fire this evening, and cooked, at least, the insects are easier to stomach.

Throughout the day, Ben frequently turns his gaze to the river, watching for his mermaid savior. But she doesn't show herself.

 

* * *

 

The next few days pass in much the same way. Ben awakens in the morning to find fresh scales pressed to his ever healing wound. He washes himself, attempts (and fails) to hunt, reties the splint on his leg. He does manage to catch some crawdads with a stick, which makes for a nice change of nourishment.

And he watches, watches, watches for that elusive mermaid. A few times he thinks he sees her tail glinting in the sun, or swears he feels eyes trained on him. But when turns his head, the moment is lost and he sees nothing.

He calls out to her. He wonders if he's been driven mad from the isolation but he's desperate to speak to someone. Even someone who won't respond to him. Even someone who may not even understand his words. The silence is too much to bear.

He greets her in the morning, thanking her for the scales. He calls out to her when he goes about his daily tasks. He bids her goodnight when he sleeps.

By the third night, he begins to tell her stories. _If she’s even listening._ Maybe he tells them to himself.

Stories his uncle told him of his travels. As the younger sibling, Ben’s uncle had been free to pursue his own dreams, whereas his mother had been trained for the throne. He'd been trained in the magical arts as well, and instructed Ben for a time in his youth, until an accident, a spell gone horribly wrong, had led the man to give up his craft and become a recluse. It was then that Ben turned to Sir Snoke for guidance, though for some reason he doesn’t want to dwell on this.

He tells stories of his grandfather, who had seized the throne when Alderaan had been in the throes of chaos and civil war.

Stories of his grandmother, who had a claim to the throne in her own right. Marriage to her had been advantageous for his grandfather, yes, but it had also been an act of love.

Stories of the great knight that had been his grandfather's best friend - and the man Ben had been named for.

They were stories Ben had heard a thousand times growing up. He didn't know if his mermaid could understand the tales, but alone by this river, they comforted him at least.

 

* * *

 

On the seventh night, he finally sees her again.

It’s a warm night. Unseasonably warm and Ben struggles to sleep. The sun is gone but the heat from the day lingers. Usually, the wind over the river carries the coolness of the water but the air is heavy tonight and there is no breeze.

Ben is fitful, tossing and turning as he struggles to find comfort. He doesn’t bother with his lean-to, opting instead to lay down under the open sky. He chases sleep but finds himself hovering in that hazy place between consciousness and slumber.

He thinks it’s the beginning of a dream when he suddenly feels something cool against his skin. He envisions water washing over him, imagines himself diving into the river for respite from the late spring heat.

_But no._

The cool touch isn’t everywhere. It’s only at his side, where his wound is not closed yet, but rapidly healing.

_Rapidly healing because a mermaid visits him in his sleep._

Suddenly Ben’s eyes fly open and he’s met with the mermaid leaning over him and those deep, startled hazel eyes he’d stared into that first day. She looks just as shocked as she did then. He reaches out to grasp the hand that is touching his skin but she rolls away on the dirt, dragging herself back towards the water’s edge.

“Wait!” he cries out, sitting up. Then he lowers his voice, not wanting to scare her. “Please don’t go.”

The mermaid is out of his reach, but she pauses where she is. Her wary eyes dart from his face down to his belt where his dagger is sheathed, and back up again.

“Put your blade aside,” she commands, her voice low and cautious.

 _So she does share his tongue_ , Ben thinks, gratefully.

Then he glances towards his dagger, tucked securely in its holder. He hasn’t felt the need to sleep with it in his hand since that first night, but though he no longer fears _her,_ he doesn’t like to be without a weapon it the wilderness.

“You saved me,” he tells the mermaid. “I won’t hurt you.”

“Put your blade aside,” she insists again and so this time Ben nods.

He unclasps the belt, leaving the kyber dagger encased, as he suspects she would prefer and tosses the whole thing towards his lean-to, where his other weapons already lay. Once he has done so, the mermaid pulls herself close again.

Ben holds himself as still as a statue as she resumes her work of peeling off the old scales and pressing new ones to his flesh. Ben finds himself unable to look away. He’s never encountered a creature like her and he wants to memorize every bit of her now that she isn’t fleeing and hiding.

As before, Ben finds it interesting that she adorns her hair, much as a human woman would, though of course, the women of the court favor carved combs and jeweled pins, over bones and shells. She _doesn’t_ share the human urge for modesty, which Ben supposes makes sense for a woman who lives in the river, but he blushes and pointedly avoids focusing on her bare chest.

Instead, his eyes trail to where her tanned skin dissolves into scales, watching the moonlight glimmer and reflect off her tail. It’s silver, but also _more_ than silver, sparkling pink and green and blue, and it’s accented with fins that look like nature’s own gauze and lace, more beautiful than anything a person could hope to weave. Her tail reminds Ben of the water itself – not only the color but in the way it seems to suggest strength and motion even as she sits so very still.

She works in silence but he’s desperate to hear her speak again.

“Doesn’t that hurt?” he asks, wincing as she tugs a scale from her tail and presses it to his skin. He tingles at the contact. _Is it the magic component of the scale that elicits that reaction or is it her?_

“A bit. No more than if I scrape against a rock while swimming,” she responds. “I’ll be fine as long as I don’t lose too many at once.”

“Well thank you all the same. You helped me when you didn’t have to.” Ben pauses. “Why _did_ you help me?”

The mermaid is quiet for a moment, a thoughtful look on her face. “I don’t exactly know. I wasn’t going to, but then I did.” She doesn’t offer any more on the subject.

She’s finished dressing his wound and begins to scoot towards the bank. Ben is hesitant to watch her leave again. She didn’t mean for him to see her tonight; will he see her ever again?

“Wait,” he says for the second time tonight. “I haven’t had anyone to talk to in some time. Will you stay a little longer?”

The mermaid slides off the shore and into the water and Ben’s heart sinks. But then her head rises above the surface again and she rests against a rock, folding her arms across it.

“I’ll stay a bit, but I prefer to be in the water.”

“Of course,” Ben nods willingly. _Just as long as she doesn’t flee._ He pulls himself down to the edge to sit nearer to her. “Do your kind have names?”

Her eyes flash and she flicks her tail in the river angrily, churning the water. “Of course we have names. Do you think I’m no more than a wild animal?”

Ben feels his face warm. He didn’t mean to insult her. “I’m sorry. Of course not. I meant to say, what is your name?”

She still looks a bit miffed, but her gaze softens some, and she replies, “I’m Rey.”

“I’m Ben.” He forgoes using his complete name and title. They hardly matter here.

“Will you tell me one of your stories?” The mermaid, _Rey,_ asks, an expression of anticipation replacing the indignation from before.

“So you were listening?” Ben smiles softly as Rey nods. “Nice to know I wasn’t just wasting my breath. Have I told the story of when the king was kidnapped by bandits and held for ransom, and the queen herself donned a soldier’s armor to rescue him?”

“No, tell me!” Rey’s voice is breathless as she leans closer, eager to hear the tale. Ben willingly obliges.

 


	5. Five

~*~*~

Day breaks.

The sun climbs above the horizon and glimmers and glints on the surface of the river as it has so many days before. Day after day and year after year.

Rey does not unearth her shells, does not move nor count her pearls.

She hasn’t for days. When the land dweller made camp so near her hiding spot, she had been unable to approach the little nook by morning’s light without showing herself. Now… Now she no longer fears approaching the spot, or the land dweller himself, but the drive to complete the fruitless task has faded.

A new routine has fallen into place.

In the days since the land dweller – _Ben_ – had awakened as she was tending his injury, the two have developed a sort of companionship. Rey still helps to dress his wound at night, though in a day or two it will no longer be necessary. The gash is beginning to scar over, and it will close up soon.

In the morning she shares her breakfast with him (though he insists on making fire and cooking the fish she brings him; Rey has tried his offerings once or twice but much prefers the fish cool and fresh from the water rather than dried and crisp from the flame). He’d been eating insects, which Rey has enjoyed herself as a snack, but they are hardly enough to live on. Sometimes, after binding a stick to his ankle to support his injured leg, he practices walking, first in small circles and then near the edge of the forest – though never venturing in – as he tries to stalk and kill small prey. He hasn’t been successful yet.

The best part though? The best part of this new daily occurrence is the conversation. Now that she has someone to talk to, Rey fully realizes just how lonely and quiet her days used to be. But no longer.

Ben continues to tell her stories of the knights and kings and queens of the land. Of war and love and of conquest and failure.

Of the sorcerers who found ways to harness and manipulate the magic they found in nature.

These aren’t Rey’s favorite stories, but Ben insists that not all of these sorcerers hunt and kill the creatures whose magic they desire – some harvest what they seek – _steal_ , even if they don’t name it as such – and leave the creatures alive.

Rey is a flesh-eater, a predator in the waters herself, but hunting to eat, to survive, seems starkly different. She gives her scales freely to help Ben, but she knows other land dwellers might trap her, slay her if they have a kyber blade, and skin them all from her body if she were to allow them so close to her.

When Rey asks Ben which category he falls into, he’s reluctant to answer. “I’ve followed both paths at different times,” he says shortly and attempts to leave it at that.

But Rey remembers his kyber dagger, and how he was reluctant to let it go.

_She has to know._

“Have you ever hunted my kind?” ‘ _Were you planning to hunt me?’_ is her unspoken question.

“What?” Ben startles. “No. I’d never actually encountered a living mermaid before you.”

“Why do you carry a kyber blade? If not to hunt my kind?”

“A kyber blade has many properties and uses, not all of them destructive,” Ben says.

“But they _are_ used to hunt water dwellers, are they not?” Rey is insistent.

“Well, yes, I suppose so,” Ben hedges, “but not just for _hunting._ It’s one of the few ways we are able to defend ourselves against magic folk.”

“Defend! Water dwellers aren’t aggressive,” Rey protests.

Ben looks embarrassed as he speaks. “People tell stories of merfolk who spin nets with their song, seducing humans with their voice and luring sailors to their deaths. They hear the music and dive into the sea where the merpeople devour them and collect their bones as trophies.”

Rey feels a pang in her chest. Part of the tale _is_ true – water dwellers _are_ gifted with an enchanting voice, but they are not malicious. To hear Ben speak of her people as murderers, as cannibals, hurts. _Is that how he sees her?_ Disappointment and anger war inside of her; offense finally winning out.

“And have I tried to lure you into danger? Have I seduced you?” Rey demands hotly.

A faint blush blooms on Ben’s cheek and ears. “No,” he admits softly.

"Don't your kind pay homage to the gods and guardians in the temples? Don't the priests and priestesses speak of our histories?"

"Of course, where do you think the stories began?"

Confusion floods Rey. "These accusations come from your temple keepers? What _else_ have they told you of water dwellers?"

"They say that the guardian of the sea grew to hate the land and the creatures that walked it.  He abused the power he was given and instead of protecting the sea, he created all manner of sea monsters, including the merfolk that hunted humans. He turned the sea and its inhabitants against the land."

Rey shakes her head. "That's not it at all. That is a lie."

"Tell me the story your people share," Ben implores.

Rey begins to recount the tale she heard so often as a very small youngling.

"When the earth was young, Sol appointed three Guardians to care for the world. He chose a very devoted family, which had respected and worshiped Sol with all their hearts. The man was made Guardian of the Seas, his wife the Guardian of the Land, and their daughter, the Guardian of the Skies. This much is probably the same in your tales." Rey pauses a moment. "It _is_ true that the guardian of the sea _did_ forsake his family for his love of the sea. He didn't hate the land dwellers though. He had fallen in love with a most beautiful and unique fish and mated with her. The offspring were my kind. The land guardian was rightly angry to be cast aside.

“But since she was unable to bring harm to another Guardian, her equal, she turned her anger towards us. She cursed the water dwellers so that we must be reliant on land dwellers to live. Once a water dweller comes of age, we have a short span of time in which to mate with a human. If we do, we will live to watch the Arietids fall three hundred times and before we travel to the Asphodel Meadows. But if we fail to accomplish this by our twenty-third Arietid fall, we die forever and become part of the water itself."

Rey looks up to gauge Ben's reaction. His eyes are full of sadness, but also curiosity.

"It is true that we are gifted with an enticing song," Rey confesses. "It was the sea guardian's gift. To help counter the land guardian's curse. But we aren't murderers, and we don't eat land dwellers or horde their bones."

Her voice grows quiet. "Sometimes…land dwellers _have_ died, but it's not... well, some cannot swim and they drown when they try to reach us, especially my kin in the sea, far from the shore. I admit I never used to worry about their fates. I was so young and so many of my people were dying at the hands of the land walkers. I couldn’t mourn those that hunted us. But I see now not all are like that." Rey smiles up at Ben shyly.

Ben processes all that Rey has said, quiet and thoughtful. And then he speaks, softly, "I've never heard a mermaid song before. Will you ever sing for me?"

His voice is earnest and curious but he still doesn't realize what he's asking. Once Rey had planned to sing for him, to entice him and earn her three hundred Arietid-falls. At the start, she had waited, feeling a strange sense of duty to help him first.

But he’s healing well now, and there is no risk of him drowning like the poorly prepared sailors, yet still, she has delayed. She knows now that she cannot do it. She will not trick Ben. She will let go of her quest for more time, rather than act to deceive him.

"No," Rey answers shortly and turns her face away, firmly ending the conversation.

 

* * *

 

Rey begins to share her own stories.

She learns that although the land dwellers keep their temples and make offerings to the gods and guardians, they are not devout; it is more out of habit than belief. And besides that, many have forgotten the real histories – the priests and priestesses tell half-truths.

So Rey tells Ben the stories her own mother and father told her. She tells him stories of the gods and goddesses of the stars that his kind have forgotten. Ben’s kind recall the stories of the land guardian best, and so she tells him tales of the sky and sea guardians that his people have ignored.

She tells him of how she would speak – pray, really – to the sky guardian to take her messages to her family, wherever they may be. She doesn’t tell him that she thought the guardian sent him to her, though. She keeps that inside.

She also speaks to him about her family, not just her parents, but the short time when she was part of a whole school of river dwellers, before the size of her clan had dwindled – lost to land hunters – and before her parents hid her here. Saying goodbye had been a constant in her childhood.

But there were happy times too. She tells Ben about visiting her distant family in the open sea, of her earliest memories of digging for shells and scavenging for trinkets and treasures with her cousins, of racing through the water with other river and sea dwellers at her side.

Ben shares stories of his own childhood, too. He speaks of lessons and training and formal events – surrounded by people but with very little companionship. Different as it was from Rey’s own experiences, she surmises that it held at least a little more similarity to her time alone in this river, rather than her time before

Rey shows him some of her favorite keepsakes that she keeps woven into her hair – Some things were never meant to last, such as the thin, brittle fish bones and crawdad claws she cleans after stripping them of their meat, or the flowers and watergrass that she weaves together. These are replaced frequently. Other items, she’s held onto since she was last with her people.

She shows him a string of pearls, the larger saltwater pearls she harvested from the sea, and a silver pendant, weathered with age and water, that she once found in a river far from here. Small glass beads that she strings directly onto the strands of her hair are a particular favorite of hers.

Ben listens quietly as Rey explains where each of her treasures came from.

One day, they sit by the river’s edge, Rey in the water, resting her arms on a rock, and Ben sits near her, the legs of his trousers rolled up and his feet dangling into the river alongside her. The skin of Ben’s broad chest is no longer as pale as it once was, now spotted with freckles from days spent in the sun, though not as richly tanned as her own. The wound on his side is now closed up; there will be a lasting scar, but it is healed.

After Rey shows him one her favorite bits of glass, Ben stares at her for a moment, thoughtful. Then he reaches into his pocket.

“I want to give you something,” he says, holding his fist out before uncurling it slowly.

In his palm is a ring. Once, when she was very little, one of her cousins found a ring in the mud and silt of a river bank – it had been delicate with a glittering blue gemstone held tight by tiny gold claws. This ring is nothing like that. It is large and silver, and rather than a stone, it features a disc with a symbol raised up on it. It is a shield, divided into three parts – an intricate “S” on the left, a pair of crossed swords on the right, and at the bottom, the outline of a raw kyber crystal.

“I’ve never seen one like this!” Rey gasps in awe, reaching out and carefully tracing the image. It is beautiful but she can see it is far too big to stay on her finger.

“It’s my family crest,” Ben explains. “It’s a seal ring. When humans write letters to each other, we seal the messages closed with wax, and if you have a seal ring, you press it into the wax to mark it.”

“I’ll never write a letter,” Rey giggles. She’s seen paper before, even books. But neither are highly desired by water dwellers; they don’t exactly store well.

“No, I know. I just want you to have it.” His cheeks are a little pink. “I thought you might wear it in your hair?”

“Oh!” Rey has many treasures, but none were gifts, save the pearls her parents left behind for her to count the days by. She feels, strangely, as if she might cry, though she isn’t sad at all. “You want me to have something _of yours_?”

“Well, yes.” Ben’s voice is quiet but firm.

Rey smiles and pulls herself up onto the bank to throw her arms around him, hugging him fiercely. Heated by the sun, his skin is warm against her own cool, wet skin. He startles for a moment then wraps his own arms around her in return. When she pulls back a bit and turns her gaze to his face, Ben’s slight blush has now spread across his entire face and extends to the tips of his ears.

“Thank you,” Rey says seriously. “No one has ever given me anything just to be _nice._ ”

“You’re welcome,” Ben replies, his voice low.

“I wish I had something to give you.”

Ben smiles, his eyes soft. “You’ve already given me enough – literally part of yourself,” he said. “I might not be alive if it weren’t for you.” He lets go of Rey to gesture at the scar on his side. Then he holds up the ring again. ”This is hardly anything.”

“It means a lot all the same,” Rey says. “Will you tie it in for me?”

Ben nods and moves to thread a lock of hair through the ring. Then he stops. “Actually, can I try something else? Do you trust me?”

Rey doesn’t know what he intends to do, but she does trust him now and so she nods her assent.

Ben nudges Rey to sit in front of him and begins to loosen her hair from their three knots. He is gentle, taking care not to tug too hard, and careful in extracting her adornments. Soon there is a pile of bones and shells and beads next to them on the shore, and Ben is running his hands through her hair, using his fingers to untangle it.

Rey hums, content, and leans into his touch.

Ben coughs a little and then begins to speak. “Hair braiding is a long-standing tradition, and an art form, in my homeland,” he explains, as he begins to intertwine strands of her hair together. “There are different braids to signify different stages of life, events, social status, and so forth. Though of course, some are just meant to be pretty.” Rey can hear the smile in his voice.

“And what special braid did you choose for me?”

He is quiet for a few moments, as he weaves her hair. Then he takes a breath and continues, “Many queens have worn this braid.”

“I am worthy of this braid?” Rey asks, her voice playful.

“Yes.” Ben’s answer is swift but short.

He works in silence then. From time to time, he pulls something from the pile to lace into the braids. Rey closes her eyes and loses herself in the sensation. She’s nearly fallen asleep when Ben’s hands stop moving. The sudden stillness, the loss of his touch, brings her back.

“There.” Ben’s voice is more breath than sound.

Rey leans over the edge of the riverbank to get a glimpse herself in the water. The blurry image isn’t much – when she was little, she had seen herself in a looking glass once, but it was so long ago she can hardly recall what it was like to see her reflection undistorted. But she can see that Ben has coiled the braids around her head, weaving in her trinkets here and there.

“Wait a moment.”

At the sound of Ben’s voice, Rey turns around to see him rise and walk towards the lean-to where he sometimes sleeps. He moves slowly but doesn’t limp on his bad leg as much as he used to. The bone is healing as well. He retrieves the sheath that holds his longsword and returns to the bank.

“Here,” he says, as he kneels down next to Rey and carefully removes the sword from its sheath. “You can use this to look at it.”

He holds the blade at an angle for her and, though it is small and she can only see bits and pieces at a time, Rey can suddenly look at herself properly for the first time in ages. She takes her time, turning and shifting as needed to look at every detail.

Her hair has been parted down the middle, and two plaits, one on each side, follow the base of her hairline to the back of her neck, then cross and climb again to the crown of her head. There, Ben has woven something truly magical – the braids twist in on themselves and her hair itself looks like a flower in bloom.

Ben has also woven her favorite keepsakes into the braids – her pearls and beads are scattered throughout, like sparkling stars across the sky, and bones and glass accent the braids coiled around her head, while one of her larger shells emerges from the center of the flower. At the base of the flower, right in front where the two plaits came together before morphing into the “petals,” Ben has attached her newest treasure – his seal ring.

“Ben!” Rey’s voice is a quiet gasp.

She catches his eyes in the reflection, just for a moment. He’s watching her with such a startling intensity in his eyes that she turns around to meet his gaze head-on. But when she does, his face is smooth and calm again and she finds herself wondering if she’d imagined it. She finds it difficult to look away all the same. He lowers the sword to the ground.

Finally, she speaks again, breaking the silence. “It’s so beautiful. Thank you.” Rey inhales, then, steeling herself to make her confession. “My mother used to tie my hair up in buns, to keep it out of my face for swimming. I never could bring myself to change it. Even when I found new things to put in my hair, I kept the style the same – three strong knots…I was so alone, for so long, and I needed something from my past to hold on to.”

“You’re not alone. Not anymore.” Ben’s eyes meet Rey’s. The intense fire returns, though tempered by something softer as well.

“Neither are you.” Rey smiles up at him. And for this moment it is true. She tries not to think of how well he walked to fetch the sword and the fact that his injury won’t prevent him from traveling much longer.

“Will you sing for me?” Ben asks. He hadn’t repeated the request since that first time until now. His voice is lower, and the undercurrent of _hopefulness_ is stronger this time.

_It’s tempting_ , Rey thinks. It would be _so_ easy, and as natural as swimming.

But she remains adamant. She shakes her head, softly. At the same time, however, she reaches out to clasp Ben’s hand with her own. She will not bewitch him.

_But maybe she doesn’t have to._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you like it! I really enjoyed writing this chapter. Never over Ben and Rey falling for each other, in any universe. :) 
> 
> I picture the braid I describe for Rey as a blend of the two below: wrapped braids and a flower. The flower is more on top of her head though, since she wouldn't be able to see the back of her head.


End file.
